If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me (Luke 9:2323And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. (Luke 9:23))., He that taketh not his cross, and followeth after Me, is not worthy of Me (MATT. 10:3838And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. (Matthew 10:38)).
HOW little some of us know of this, and yet if our hearts are truly attached to Christ, surely we should not draw back or shrink from the path He sets before us. It means gain, undoubtedly, in that which is abiding and eternal, if it means loss here. It means nearness to Him who has led the way, the conscious support of His hand in the difficulties that we are sure to meet with; and though we naturally shrink from trouble and fear the future, yet if we have proved in any measure what it is to have His company in the trial, we would not have been without it.
To him who realizes what the death of the Lord Jesus Christ means, not only for his sins, but to deliver from this present evil world, this world becomes the "valley of the shadow of death," the deep, dark shadow of His death lying upon all that the world is and can offer to attract our hearts; yet he can joyfully exclaim, "I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.”
The cross means death—I do not mean the death of the body, but to all that in which will works in it—and we cannot go in for it in our own strength; on the contrary, it implies that we have none. All we can do is to put our hand in His in simple childlike trust, looking to Him where He is in resurrection glory, walking, in the light of that scene, our life hid in Him, the other side of death; but as to life down here, reckoning ourselves to be dead, all that we are gone under God's judgment, too incurably bad for Him to do anything with. The more we know Him, surely the more we can trust His love as to our circumstances, as to everything. We sometimes fear the consequences of following Him wholly, but may we not trust His loving heart to do the very best for us, and have confidence that He will not suffer us to be tempted above that we are able to bear? He is worthy of our whole heart's affections.
Oh, let us not give Him a second place; let Him be first and all. We are His, left here to be for Him. May we not dishonor Him and grieve His heart by our coldness and half-heartedness and worldliness, but may we seek to walk worthy of Him to whom we belong, who loves us so perfectly and would draw us with those bands of love, that we might follow Him wholly. W.